Work Smarter — How To Streamline Your eBay Business

Automating the Processes
Imagine a tool that eliminates most of the busy work associated with running your eBay business. According to Dave Cotter, that was the idea behind his company, http://Mpire.com. After talking to hundreds of eBay sellers and hearing the same complaint again and again — people were spending too much time running their e-businesses — Cotter and co-founder, Greg Harrison, were inspired to create a tool to automate the processes involved.
4 Advantages to Auction Automation
"The point behind automating your business," explains Cotter, "is that it really allows you to go in and spend some time writing your listings. That is where you’re going to really get a high return.

" In other words, spend your time on creating quality content, not on what ought to be routine maintenance. With the right automation solution you can simplify the time-consuming components of your business:
• Manage Your Inventory.
An automated system keeps track of your inventory: how many items you have in stock, how many you’ve sold, how many are awaiting payment, how many are awaiting shipping. So you never again need to worry about selling more products than you have.
• Manage Your Customer Service.

With a good automated system you can customize automatic email templates to send your customers promotional notifications. You can also set up automatic correspondence to request feedback, confirm orders and receipt of payments, and notify your customers of their orders’ shipping status.
• Manage Your Listing Process.
You no longer have to design a listing for each item you put up for auction. You can simply choose from a set of listings — you only have to put in the text. Once you do, your listing is automatically moved to the Active Section. When it sells, it’s moved to the Sold Section so you can see that it’s awaiting shipment and where it’s going. And your shipping labels print automatically.
• Manage Your Profits.
An automated system calculates your eBay fees, your PayPal fees, your shipping fees.

It lets you see not only whether or not you’re profitable over all, but which products are profiting you and how profitable they are.
Time is Money — Is Your E-Biz Costing You?
Many eBay sellers are so bogged down with all the details of running their business that they don’t even know whether or not they’re making a profit. They only know what’s in their PayPal account versus their checking account — they don’t have time to break it down any further than that. Encourages Cotter, “You'll be shocked at how much more fun you have, if you start to see your profits increase and really understand what products sell and how to make smarter choices about your business.